Adventure Time: The Cartoon for Men

Unlike actually-for-adults fare like Family Guy and the excellent Bob's Burgers, or the for-children-but-laden-with-in-jokes Pixar oeuvre (their films reference alcohol, The Shining, and homosexuality), Adventure Time is a children's cartoon that adults enjoy watching. Hand-drawn with bright colors and simple lines, the Cartoon Network show (which will be on Netflix starting March 30) follows a pair of brothers, Jake the dog and Finn the human (don't ask), who use bravery and magic to defeat bad guys and save the myriad princesses who live in the Land of Ooo.

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The show is unique in that it doesn't feel like a show that grown-ups created for an imaginary market of kids, but rather one they created for the younger versions of themselves. Finn's best friend is also his dog and brother, who will never die, is always available to play, and possesses the ability to transform his body to whatever size or shape suits their purpose. They have a device that looks like a Sega Genesis and operates like something Steve Jobs dreamt on a peyote-fueled spirit quest — a combination video game console, outlet, toaster, camera, and friend. The refuse in the oft-visited Candy Kingdom is obviously candy, which is all they eat. They live in a tree house and their blankets are soft animal skins.

And then there are the adventures. There are familiar villains, popping up for continued feuding, the way your action figures would just because you had a limited supply — besides, it's nice to have a little history between foes. The Ice King is always stealing the princesses and locking them in his Ice Castle because his misanthropy makes him lonely, like Larry David if he had become a magical ruler instead of a television writer. There are quests with the Bubblegum Princess, who alternately saves and is saved by Finn and Jake, and she's smart and beautiful and a little older, like the next-door neighbor with whom you waited for the bus. There are adventures to save the world and adventures for the hell of it. There are adventures to get things they want, like the Ancient Psychic Tandem War Elephant, whose coveting and patient retrieval feel like saving up allowance to buy a Lego Death Star, or collecting three years of Ploids to get some piece of crap that wasn't worth eating all those Doritos.

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There's a Hitchcockian episode where a tiny cat assassin literally crawls into Jake's head and threatens to kill him if he tells anyone about her presence or fails to carry out her murderous plot. There's a genuinely touching shades-of-As-Good­-as-It-Gets vignette in which a Snow Golem begrudgingly adopts a Fire Wolf Pup and almost melts returning it to its family in the Fire Kingdom. In my favorite episode, Finn and Jake take in a gigantic, blank-faced bear of whom Jake becomes suspicious and jealous when he starts to dress like Finn and use human speech.

At fifteen minutes, Adventure Time is a low-commitment diversion from adulthood. If you have kids, all the more reason to check it out. The show airs at 7:30 p.m. ET on Mondays, but I recommend DVRing it and watching on Saturday mornings. That's how you're supposed to watch cartoons, remember?